The present invention relates to sanitary food-handling gloves and a method of manufacturing such gloves, and more particularly to food-handling gloves that prevent microbial transfer and methods for making such gloves.
The food industry has long been concerned about bacterial contamination to consumers through the handling of food by food industry workers. Workers in the food industry are frequently required to wear gloves to reduce the likelihood that the bacteria from their hands is transferred to consumers. However, even gloves may pick up contaminating bacteria from food or work surfaces, thereby significantly reducing the effectiveness of the gloves the longer they are worn. A solution, albeit a costly one, is to have the workers change or disinfect their gloves frequently. The food industry would prefer a more workable and cost effective solution.
The food industry generally uses gloves made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), polyethylene (PE), and Acrylonitrile-butadeine (Nitrile). These gloves must meet federal standards for thickness, strength, elasticity, deformation, etc. Gloves of other materials have been tried, but they either do not meet the federal standards or are not acceptable to the food industry (e.g., high cost, weak seams, difficult to don and remove, uncomfortable to wear, etc.).
In handling food using disposable gloves, it is desirable to provide continued bacterial protection during extended glove use. Despite this need, the food industry has been unable to find an antimicrobial agent that meets federal standards for food handling, that is useable with inexpensive disposable gloves, and that effectively reduces the risk of bacterial contamination during prolonged wear of the gloves. For example, conventional PVC gloves may be dusted with an antimicrobial agent, but the agent would not be effective for prolonged periods because it would rub off during use and disappear completely when the gloves are immersed in water.
For the retail food industry, where food products are handled shortly before being served to consumers, distributing a releasable chemical, such as an antimicrobial agent, in food-handling gloves for providing bacterial protection is not suggested by the prior art and is contrary to accepted wisdom. For example, when the glove is in use, the chemical is released from the glove to other surfaces including the food under preparation; thereby the chemical becomes an additive to the food being prepared for serving. This chemical additive may affect the taste of the food, may cause allergic reactions, may cause a negative psychological response (i.e., opposition or repulsion to the addition of an antimicrobial chemical to the food), may cause health concerns about eating nonorganic foods, and may cause negative health consequences to consumers due to the cumulative or long term consumption of the chemical. Further, antimicrobial agents are generally not known to be edible.
Accordingly, the prior art has focused primarily on antimicrobial solutions in the medical field. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,091,442 issued Feb. 25, 1992 to Milner suggests that an antimicrobial agent, such as triclosan, may be mixed with a natural rubber latex plastisol to provide antimicrobial protection for a tubular article such as a condom or catheter. However, the effectiveness of the antimicrobial agent in the article will still diminish during use because the agent will gradually disappear from the surface of the article and will not be replenished. That is, the triclosan will be removed from the surface of the natural rubber latex long before the latex wears down to expose the triclosan in the interior thereof. The nature of the natural rubber latex prevents the antimicrobial agent from migrating to the exposed surface of the latex from its interior. This limitation may be acceptable where the article makes a single contaminating contact, but is not acceptable for gloves that will have numerous contacts with diverse potential contaminants.
The Milner patent mentions that PVC may be used instead of the natural rubber latex, but does not suggest how this is to be done. The method disclosed relates only to natural rubber latex, and the differences between latex and PVC preclude the application of the disclosed method to PVC.
It has also been suggested that an antimicrobial agent may be added to a plastic or polymeric film material, such as PE, that is used to make a surgical drape sheet. The structure of the PE allows some antimicrobial agents to migrate to the exposed surface of the drape from the interior thereof when the agent has been removed from the surface (see U.S. Pat. No. 5,069,907 issued Dec. 3, 1991 to Mixon, et al.). However, the process and apparatus used therewith does not suggest adding an antimicrobial agent to plastic or polymeric film gloves for food handling. Antimicrobial agents are generally not known to be safe for oral consumption.
Additionally, food-handling gloves and medical drapes (Mixon, et al.) operate differently and are manufactured to meet different industry and federal requirements. For example, both the process of manufacture and the physical characteristics of the medical drape are directed at providing high puncture resistance.
Mixon, et al. also discloses a method of manufacturing plastic or polymeric sheets through extrusion of a thin film. Forming gloves by heat cutting two layers of extruded film is well known in the art. However, despite the low cost of manufacturing gloves through the extrusion-heat cutting technique and the long felt need for improved microbial protection of food consumers from food contamination, the food industry has not produced a low cost disposable glove having extended antimicrobial qualities.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide novel gloves and a method of making gloves that obviate the problems of the prior art.
It is another object of the present invention to provide novel microbial transfer prevention gloves and a method of providing microbial transfer prevention to such gloves in which an antimicrobial agent in the glove material migrates to the exposed surfaces of the gloves when the agent at the glove surface has been depleted.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a novel method of making food-handling gloves in which an antimicrobial agent is mixed in a polyethylene film before the gloves are formed by a heat cutting process whereby the antimicrobial agent migrates to the exposed surfaces of the gloves when the antimicrobial agent at the surface has been depleted.
These and many other objects and advantages of the present invention will be readily apparent to one skilled in the art to which the invention pertains from a perusal of the claims, the appended drawings, and the following detailed description of preferred embodiments.